If This Website Looks Blurry To You, You've Got Bad Posture

posted by Dave Basner -
Sep 10, 2019

All those times your parents told you to sit up straight, they didn't just want you to look more confident, they were concerned about your health, and it turns out they were right. Studies have shown that 80% of all Americans suffer from back pain at some point in their lives and one of the biggest causes is bad posture. Nowadays, there are gadgets to help you keep your spine straight, from corset-like straps to technologically advanced devices, but not everyone wants to wear something all day long. For those people, there is a new site.

It's called Fix Posture and uses your computer's camera to make sure you are sitting properly. That means keeping the screen at eye level, putting your feet flat on the grown, pulling your elbows close to your body, relaxing your shoulders and ensuring they are level, and, of course, fully supporting your back. If you aren't doing all that, Fix Posture makes the screen blurry. The worse your posture gets, the less clear your screen becomes.

So how's it work? Using info from your webcam, the site examines the relationship between your shoulders, your eyes and the horizon to ensure you're sitting up straight. If it spots a knee or a foot in the image, it knows you are improperly seated and will blur the screen. The only way for text to appear clear is by fixing your posture.

For now, this only works on the Fix Posture homepage, but soon it might become a browser extension or app that functions in more places. They also understand the fear of giving them permissions to your webcam and assure users that they won't steal any data.